A study on conceptual metaphors of friendship in english and vietnamses=nghiên cứu về các ẩn dụ tình bạn trong tiếng anh và tiếng việt

VINH UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENT OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES HOÀNG THỊ THANH NGA A STUDY ON CONCEPTUAL METAPHORS OF FRIENDSHIP IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE (NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ CÁC ẨN DỤ TÌNH BẠN TRONG TIẾNG ANH VÀ TIẾNG VIỆT) GRADUATION THESIS FIELD: LINGUISTICS Vinh, May 2014 VINH UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENT OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES A STUDY ON CONCEPTUAL METAPHORS OF FRIENDSHIP IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE (NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ CÁC ẨN DỤ TÌNH BẠN TRONG TIẾNG ANH VÀ TIẾNG VIỆT) GRADUATION THESIS FIELD: LINGUISTICS Student: HOÀNG THỊ THANH NGA, 51A_ENGLISH Supervisor: NGUYỄN THỊ KIM ANH, M.A Vinh, May 2014 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS For the completion of this study, I have been fortunate to receive invaluable contributions from many people First of all, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor, M.A NGUYEN THI KIM ANH, MA for her absolutely indispensable assistance, excellent suggestions, expert advice and detail critical comments, without which the study would not have been complete I would also like to give my sincere thanks to all my teachers from the Foreign Languages Department of Vinh University for their lectures and advice which are very useful for me to finish this study I would like to show my sincere thanks to my classmates who help me a lot in giving their invaluable comments and suggestions while the work of this assignment was in progress Last but not least, I also owe my indebtedness to my family members for their love, care and encouragement in the process of writing this assignment Vinh, May 2014 Hoang Thi Thanh Nga ABSTRACT This study concerns about the metaphorical expressions and culture features in expressing friendship concepts of both English and Vietnamese Basing on cognitive linguistics theory (mainly Conceptual Metaphor), this research has made an investigation into the FRIENDSHIP IS A PLANT and FRIENDSHIP IS A BUILDING from some Articles, proverbs, quotes Next, several comments have been made to discuss what mechanism helps language users to understand an abstract concept (friendship) based on another concepts (plant, building) Eventually, the author gives some suggested activities and exercises for students and learners to understand more about these structures and apply for the tests with the best results TABLE OF CONTENTS CONTENT Page ABSTRACT i TABLE OF CONTENTS ii CHAPTER INTRODUCTION 1.1 REASONS FOR CHOOSING THE STUDY 1.2 AIMS OF THE STUDY 1.3 SCOPE OF THE STUDY 1.4 METHODS OF THE STUDY 1.5 DESIGN OF THE STUDY CHAPTER LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 2.1 LITERATURE REVIEW 2.2 AN OVERVIEW OF COGNITIVE LINGUISTICS 2.3 CONCEPTUAL METAPHOR 2.3.1 Metaphor in traditional views 2.3.2 Metaphor in the light of cognitive linguistics 2.3.3 Conceptual metaphor 2.3.3.1 Source domain and target domain 2.3.3.2 Mapping 2.4 METAPHOR AND CULTURE 2.4.1 Relations between metaphor and culture 2.4.2 Dimensions of metaphor variation 10 2.4.2.1 Cross-cultural dimension of metaphor variation 10 2.4.2.2 Within-cultural dimension of metaphor variation 11 2.4.3 Variation in metaphorical linguistic expressions 11 2.4.4 Metaphor and socio-cultural experience 11 CHAPTER A STUDY ON CONCEPTUAL METAPHORS OF FRIENDSHIP IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE 13 3.1 FRIENDSHIP IS A PLANT 13 3.1.1 Sowing the seeds of friendship 14 3.1.2 Growing up friendship 16 3.1.3 Facing hardships in friendship 17 3.1.4 Nurturing friendship 18 3.1.5 Blooming friendship’s flowers 20 3.2 FRIENDSHIP IS A BUILDING 22 3.2.1 Building a friendship 22 3.2.2 Falling apart in friendship 23 3.2.3 Mending friendship 24 3.2.4 A towering friendship 26 3.3 DISCUSSION OF FINDINGS 28 3.3.1 Similarities and differences of FRIENDSHIP IS A PLANT in English and Vietnamese 28 3.3.1.1 Similarities 28 3.3.1.2 Differences 29 3.3.2 Similarities and differences of FRIENDSHIP IS A BUILDING in English and Vietnamese 30 3.3.2.1 Similarities 30 3.3.2.2 Differences 30 CHAPTER 4: SOME SUGGESTIONS FOR USING FRIENDSHIP METAPHORS IN TEACHING AND LEARNING ENGLISH 32 4.1 SOME SUGGESTED ACTIVITIES FOR USING FRIENDSHIP METAPHORS IN TEACHING AND LEARNING ENGLISH 32 4.1.1 Interview a star 32 4.1.2 Role play 33 4.1.3 Opinion exchange 35 4.1.4 Picture description 36 4.2 SOME SUGGESTED EXERCISES FOR USING FRIENDSHIP METAPHORS IN TEACHING AND LEARNING ENGLISH 38 4.2.1 Listing 38 4.2.2 Putting words in suitable columns with given words 39 4.2.3 Matching 39 4.2.4 Finding out the English equivalents of the following Vietnamese expressions 40 CHAPTER CONCLUSION 41 5.1 RECAPITULATION 41 5.2 SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER STUDIES 41 REFERENCES CHAPTER INTRODUCTION 1.1 REASONS FOR CHOOSING THE STUDY English is now playing an indispensable role in all fields of life It is not difficult to realize the dominance of English in international communication, science, business, entertainment, broadcast and education Therefore, mastering this necessary language will bring people more opportunities to get achievements in their life Besides, the demand for learning English worldwide, particularly in Vietnam is so great that many people are now making a point of learning it That is why English is chosen as Vietnamese’s compulsory foreign language subject For Vietnamese learners of English, particularly advanced learners, knowing and understanding metaphors is a significant step to mastering this language The more fluently and accurately Vietnamese learners can use English metaphorical expressions, the more successfully they can deal with the language of English in literature as well as in real life Moreover, when studying one language, it is necessary not only to study vocabulary, grammar, skills but also to know how to use language in a natural way It is an interesting fact that metaphor is specially used in daily life in any language It reflects distinctive features of each language, so it can be the bridge linking the soul of different nations Thus, it should open doors to friendly atmosphere on the part of both native and non-native speakers, which leads to global mutual understanding in cultures, customs, traditions and behaviors as well - the key factor to avoid culture shocks during international communication Metaphor has been studied and viewed at different angles by numerous scholars It is still a controversial topic which attracts people’s interest Friendship is one of the abstract domains that is not easy to understand and explain, thus, it can be seen in various ways Speakers of different languages have their own ways to understand and explain the concept “friendship” As a result of various ways people use in attempt to talk and explain about their different experiences with friendship, plentiful metaphor expressions describing this emotion appear As an English learner who has much interested in metaphors, the author decides to choose the topic “A Study on Conceptual Metaphors of Friendship in English and Vietnamese” as the study of her graduation thesis Hopefully, the study, to some extent, can make a small contribution to understanding about the metaphors in general and the metaphors referring to friendship in particular 1.2 AIMS OF THE STUDY The aims of the study are as follows:  Provide a better understanding of cognitive linguistics with fundamental understandings about metaphor referring to friendship  Improve the quality of teaching and learning metaphor, especially conceptual metaphor at school In order to reach these aims above, the study has to achieve the following objectives:  To study the meanings of friendship metaphors in English and Vietnamese equivalents, and then to find out the similarities, differences between English and Vietnamese metaphor referring to friendship and distinction between English and Vietnamese culture through those metaphors  To provide some techniques that can help in teaching and suggested exercises in learning friendship metaphor To fully achieve these aims, the study has to answer questions:  What are the common friendship metaphors used in English and Vietnamese?  Why is friendship metaphorically understood and talked in such ways?  How to teach and translate English by using metaphor from the elementary to advanced level? 1.3 SCOPE OF THE STUDY The study concerns about friendship metaphors in English and Vietnamese However, “A Study on Conceptual Metaphors of Friendship in English and Vietnamese” is a broad topic As a graduation paper, it is impossible to cover all kinds of friendship metaphors Thus, the study only focuses on two common friendship metaphors in English in the view of cognitive linguistics A contrastive analysis of friendship metaphors in English and Vietnamese would be another research at a higher level Activities and exercises presented in Chapter only serve as samples to illustrate how to teach and translate English for learners at intermediate level to advanced level 1.4 METHODS OF THE STUDY To carry out this research, the author used both quantitative and qualitative methods The following instruments have been utilized: - Inductive investigating and analyzing methods - Collecting/Gathering data - Analysis and synthetic methods 1.5 DESIGN OF THE STUDY There are five main chapters in this graduation thesis Chapter 1: Introduction This chapter deals with the rationale, aims, scope, methods and design of the study Chapter 2: Literature review and theoretical background In this chapter, the author would like to briefly present literature review about cognitive linguistics, some general knowledge about metaphor, source domain and target domain, characteristic features of metaphor in the light of cognitive linguistics Chapter 3: A study on conceptual metaphors of friendship in English and Vietnamese This chapter will present the methodology adopted to collect data for the research, which includes the description of research questions, setting, instrumentations, and English and Vietnamese friendship in term of FRIENDSHIP IS A BUILDING metaphor? Differences between England and Vietnamese friendship expressions come from differences in their thoughts Vietnamese friendship is influenced by Collectivism For Vietnamese people, friendship is an essential thing, because in the conception of Vietnamese people, friends are the sidekicks, cronies One can sacrifice his or her benefits for his or her close friend Many Vietnamese proverbs talk about the importance of friendship such as “when a horse is sick, the whole stable refuses grass”, “good wife is a good present”, etc When having a true friendship, Vietnamese people will cherish, respect and preserve It is a warm and close place where they can come back after sufferings, failures in life Thus the pictures as “nơi trú ẩn ấm áp”, “nơi ta tìm về” or “ngơi nhà ấm áp” are the ones that Vietnamese people usually express to show the importance of friendship On the contrary, the Western countries are characterized by Individualism Friendship is also very essential in their lives, but it is not at all For them, friendship is something that easy to come but also easy to go It seems that because of the thought of Individualism, they not want to be bound by any one And friendship is not exception They tend to live in a private space, therefore, they not really consider friendship as a house - where they can come back after the failures or sadness House is merely a place where they live only, not really a special place like the one in Vietnamese CHAPTER SOME SUGGESTIONS FOR USING FRIENDSHIP METAPHORS IN TEACHING AND LEARNING ENGLISH As we know, a metaphor is one language phenomenon which is closely linked with culture and traditional customs of a country Therefore, it is necessary to learn metaphor Within the scope of the study, we suggest a number of activities and exercises which are of the most typical types in English 4.1 SOME SUGGESTED ACTIVITIES FOR METAPHORS IN TEACHING AND LEARNING USING FRIENDSHIP 4.1.1 Interview a star Type: class group Material: some piece papers with the name of the famous people Time: minutes Preparation: none Procedure:  The teacher asks a student to go to the front of the class  This student picks a famous person who he wants to talk about  Then the other students interview her/him as that person in the term of his/her friendship Note: The teacher has made sure that the students in class not ask insulting or slanderous question like “Cao Thai Son, why you make friend with so ugly girl?” Example for the FRIENDSHIP AS A PLANT metaphor A student picks a famous singer, Ho Ngoc Ha, for instance, and goes to the front of the class Ho Ngoc Ha: Nice to meet you! Class : Nice to meet you! Student A: Can I ask you a question? Ho Ngoc Ha: You are welcome! Student A: Many people said that you are so lucky when you have a close friend Thanh Hang model Could you talk something about this companionship? Ho Ngoc Ha: This is a companionship that takes root from the trust, faith and respect Student B: When did you sow the seed of this friendship? Ho Ngoc Ha: Our friendship was sown years ago Student C: What did you when the gnawing of insects and terminates made your friendship fade? Ho Ngoc Ha: Ya In any relationships, misunderstanding and argument are unavoidable The important thing is how you solve the problems For me, I always try to nurture, water and cultivate my friendship This should be done regularly Do not wait until your friendship fade …… …… 4.1.2 Role play Type: class group Material: none Time: minutes Preparation: none Procedure:  Student sit in pairs  When all pairs have found their partners, the teacher will ask them to play a role  Students pretend they are in various social contexts and have a variety of social roles Each pair has two minutes to talk to each other  Then the teacher calls some pairs to present in front of the class Notes: The teacher should give the role which is suitable with students’ ability In addition, in role-play activities, the teacher gives information to the learners such as who they are and what they think of feel Example for the FRIENDSHIP IS BUILDING metaphor The teacher: “Imagine that you are at “I’m me” program, the topic today is “Friendship” At Youth’s view, what will you say about this topic” Student A acts as Thu Hoai - a MC Student B acts as Gia Bao - a guest Thu Hoai: Hello, I’m Thu Hoai Our program is “I’m me” Now our guest tonight is Gia Bao, a student of VU Welcome to the program, Gia Bao Gia Bao: Thanks Thu Hoai Thu Hoai: Now Gia Bao, can you tell us about your opinion of “friendship”? Gia Bao: Sure Friendship is a relationship that all the individuals can create by themselves Though it is not a relationship like that of the relationship of a mother, father, sister, brother or any of the other family but still it is one of the best relations an individual can possess And is a place that we desire to come back when we feel tired or lonely Thu Hoai: it means friendship is a special place, like a building where we can come back whenever we want So how about building a true friendship - in your opinion? Gia Bao: Building a true friendship? Umm Building a true friendship is like building a house When we start to build a house, we need to have materials such as brick, stone, cement etc; building a friendship, the mutual belief, harmony, respect and interest are indispensable Thu Hoai: Yeah, but it can be clearly seen that we can not avoid breaking or cracking in friendship How can we repair it? Gia Bao: Yes, You’re right In order to repair this broken friendship, we need time, effort and patience …………………… 4.1.3 Opinion exchange Type: class group Material: none Time: minutes Preparation: none Procedure:  The teacher divides the class into groups of five students  Then the teacher gives a situation for these groups to discuss After that each group give his own ideas Notes: The teacher should go around reminding the students to use English and to make sure that every student is discussing Example for FRIENDSHIP IS A PLANT metaphor Topic: “If you have a chance to grow a plant of friendship, what will you do?” Group 1: If I have a chance to grow my friendship, I will sow the seeds of friends carefully Every day, I will nurture and cultivate my friendship’s plant After a long time, it will bloom beautiful flowers These the most beautiful friends in the garden of friendship Group 2: If I have a chance to grow my friendship, I will make friend with someone who share the same passion for sports, hobbies, life style or perspective Deep and meaningful friendships often have to be nurtured and take time and effort to cultivate It takes time for people to get to know and to understand you and vice versa Therefore, if the gnawing of insects make friendship tree can not grow, we have to be patience to make effort in order to remain this relationship ……………………… 4.1.4 Picture description Type: Teamwork Material: some pictures Time: -6 minutes Preparation: the teacher collects some pictures of objects from the catalogues or magazines Alternatively, you may draw them Procedure:  The teacher divides class into two teams  Each team are given two or three different pictures  Each team chooses two members Then the teacher asks them to go to the board and their duties are to describe the process to grow/build a friendship base on these pictures they had  Which team can describe the process of growing a friendship best will become the winner Notes: when students are discussing the teacher should go around giving the help if necessary Example for the FRIENDSHIP AS A PLANT metaphor and FRIENDSHIP IS A BUILDING metaphor Picture Picture Picture Picture Picture Student 1: Choosing a true friendship like planting a tree Firstly, we have to choose the good seeds and then sow them carefully The seed builds the foundation of a strong and stable friendship Therefore, we should be careful and wisdom ……………… 4.2 SOME SUGGESTED EXERCISES FOR USING FRIENDSHIP METAPHORS IN TEACHING AND LEARNING ENGLISH 4.2.1 Listing Which words is running on your mind when you think of “friendship is a plant”? Suggested answer: - Take root from - Cultivate - Sow the seeds - Bloom - Nurture - Fade - Grow - Ripe - Seed - Slowly dying ………… 4.2.2 Putting words in suitable columns with given words - Take root from - Develop - Broken - Repair - Fade - Sow the seeds - Nurture - Improve - Seed - Foundation - Build - Grow - Mend - Bloom FRIENDSHIP IS A PLANT metaphor - Ripe FRIENDSHIP IS A BUILDING metaphor Suggested answer: FRIENDSHIP IS A PLANT metaphor FRIENDSHIP IS A BUILDING metaphor Take root from Develop Mend Build Sow the seeds Grow Repair Broken Ripe Seed Improve Foundation Nurture Fade Bloom 4.2.3 Matching Match up English metaphor expressions in the column A with Vietnamese equivalents in the column B A B Take root from a héo úa Sow the seeds b trưởng thành Ripe c gieo mầm Fade d chết dần chết mòn Slowly dying e bắt nguồn từ Bloom f ni dưỡng Nurture g chín muồi Grow h nở hoa Suggested answer: 1- e , 2-c , 3-g , 4-a, 5- d , 6- h , 7-f , 8-b 4.2.4 Finding out the English equivalents of the following Vietnamese expressions Héo úa Trưởng thành Gieo mầm Chết dần chết mòn Bắt nguồn từ Ni dưỡng Chín muồi Nở hoa CHAPTER CONCLUSION 5.1 RECAPITULATION In this paper, we present a brief view of theoretical background of metaphor Metaphor is traditionally viewed as a figure of speech used in literature only In the light of cognitive linguistics, however, metaphor is common in everyday language More importantly, it is considered not only a means of communication but also a vehicle of cognitive linguistics As friendship is an abstract concept which is not easy to explain People try to understand and express it by making use of their experiences of plants and buildings in the cognitive process of creating meaning extensions, and as a result, the conceptual metaphor FRIENDSHIP IS A PLANT and FRIENDSHIP IS A BUILDING are drawn out Prominent aspects of the abstract concept “friendship” are made easier to comprehend thanks to the use of conceptual shifts from domains “plant” and “building” to domain “friendship” To conclude, through two conceptual metaphors: FRIENDSHIP IS A PLANT and FRIENDSHIP IS A BUILDING, it can be seen that metaphors are widely used in Vietnamese and English to think and talk about friendship The congruent metaphors mainly come from our bodily and social experiences that are universal to all human beings regardless of language and culture On the other hand, there are unique metaphorical expressions that exist only in Vietnamese or English, as they reflect and are shaped by socio-cultural and historical experiences specific to the two languages 5.2 SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER STUDIES It is common that metaphors are the complicated language phenomenon Therefore researching metaphors in general and friendship metaphor in particular is not an easy task The truth is that our paper can not deal with all aspects of friendship metaphor Thus the authors would like to give some suggestions for further researches as follows: - A Contrastive Analysis of English and Vietnamese Metaphor of Friendship - A Contrastive Analysis of the Relationship Between English Culture and English Metaphor of Friendship - A Study on the Grammatical Structure of Friendship Metaphors in English and Vietnamese To sum up, because of the limitation of time, mistakes are unavoidable Thus, the authors would be very delighted to receive all the remarks, comments as well as advice to improve this study REFERENCES IN ENGLISH [1] Daniela R., Metaphor Between Language And Thought, Craiova, Universitaria Publishing House, 2008 [2] Laoff G & Johnson M., Metaphors we live by, Chicago & London: The University of Chicago Press, 1980 [3] Nguyen H, Understanding English Semantics, Hanoi Vietnam National University Publishing House, 2004 [4] Ning Y., The Contemporary Theory of Metaphor: A Perspective From Chinese, John Benjamins Publishing, 1998 [5] Kövecses Z, Metaphor: a practical introduction, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2002 [6] Kövecses Z, Metaphor in culture: universality and variation, Cambridge, UK, New York : Cambridge University Press, 2006 [7] Quinn N, & Holland, D, Cultural models in language and thought Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987 [8] Rardden G & Divren R, Cognitive English Grammar, Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing House, 2007 [9] Varela, Francisco J.;Evan Thompson; Eleanor Rosch The Embodied Mind:Cognitive Science and Human Experience Cambridge:MIT Press, 1991 [10] Vicky T, Mappings from the Source Domain of Plant in Mandarin Chinese, Graduation thesis, National Taiwan University, 2009 IN VIETNAMESE [1] Đỗ Hữu Châu (1996) Từ vựng ngữ nghĩa tiếng Việt NXB Đại học Quốc gia [2] Trần Văn Cơ (2010) Ngôn ngữ học tri nhận – Từ điển tường giải đối chiếu NXB Phương Đông [3] Đinh Trọng Lạc, Nguyễn Thái Hòa (1995) Phong cách học tiếng Việt NXB Giáo Dục [4] Lý Tồn Thắng (2004) Ngơn ngữ học tri nhận – Từ lí thuyết đại cương đến thực tiễn tiếng Việt NXB Phương Đông [5] Trần Ngọc Thêm.(1997) Cơ sở văn hóa Việt Nam NXB Giáo Dục [6] Phạm Văn Tình (2006) Luận chữ Luận Nghĩa NXB Văn hóa- Thơng Tin [7] Hồng Tất Trường (1993) Từ vựng học Tiếng Anh NXB Trường Đại học Sư phạm Ngoại ngữ Hà Nội WEBSITES http://www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/metaphor http://www.ehow.com http://learning.blogs.nytimes.com http://quizlet.com http://ccsenet.org http://www.netdoctor.co.uk http://unveiledwife.com ...VINH UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENT OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES A STUDY ON CONCEPTUAL METAPHORS OF FRIENDSHIP IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE (NGHIÊN CỨU VỀ CÁC ẨN DỤ TÌNH BẠN TRONG TIẾNG ANH VÀ TIẾNG VIỆT) GRADUATION... linguistics, it appears both in literature and in daily life That is why Lakoff & Johnson [2] stated it as a matter of extraordinary rather than ordinary language Additionally, according to Lakoff... describe analogical reasoning and inferences 2.4 Metaphor and culture 2.4.1 Relations between metaphor and culture Culture and language have a close relationship and can be inseparable Language is